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Initially named North Eastern Penitentiary, USP Lewisburg was one of four federal prisons to open in 1932.[6][7] It was designed by Alfred Hopkins.

USP Lewisburg had a prison riot in November 1995. Although started by only 10 prisoners, more than 20 visited the hospital that November 1, with one prisoner recording multiple broken bones and missing teeth. Many were sentenced to the "hole" and over 400 were transferred.[8] This incident thrust the Penitentiary into the national spotlight, where it gained much of its current notoriety.

A local non-profit group, the Lewisburg Prison Project, assists prisoners here and in the surrounding area with issues of conditions of confinement.[9]

USP Lewisburg was the focus of the 1991 Academy Award-nominated documentaryDoing Time: Life Inside the Big House by filmmakers Alan and Susan Raymond. The one hour long film described conditions inside the prison and focused specifically on the abolition of parole within the federal system and the fears held by many prisoners about re-integrating into society upon their eventual release from prison.[10]

As of 2009, USP Lewisburg was designated as a Special Management Unit intended to house the most violent and disruptive inmates in the Bureau of Prisons. Although most USP Lewisburg inmates are housed in the SMU, there remains a work cadre of approximately 200 inmates in the USP's general population.

In July 2008, correction officers at USP Lewisburg expressed concerns about underfunding. Over the past four years, union leaders and other officials had been lobbying in an attempt to quell staff reductions and cutting costs. The Federal Bureau of Prisons had proposed $143 million in possible spending cuts, including not replacing vehicles and equipment, eliminating overtime, reducing corrections officer training, and a possible cut in officer staff positions.[11] Under such conditions, many of the Correctional Officers expressed concerns about their own safety.

Founder and crime boss of the Vietnamese Born to Kill gang during the late 1980s and early 1990s, and was one of the largest purveyors of counterfeit watches in the New York counterfeiting industry. Was convicted of murder, extortion, racketeering alongside a multitude of charges in 1992 by a Federal Judge in Brooklyn.[13][14]

American skyjacker who hijacked United Airlines Flight 855, extorted $500,000 dollars, and parachuted out the back. Escaped from prison in 1974 by stealing a garbage truck and ramming the gate. McCoy was later killed in a shootout with FBI agents.

Jayme Gordon

98605-038

Released on 3 November 2018 from federal Residential Reentry Management housing in Philadelphia.

American artist who tried to sue DreamWorks claiming to have came up with the idea for Kung Fu Panda, and altered pictures of a story he copyrighted as proof.